It was there at the cafe Milo worked at, one particularly gray morning, that he saw you.

It didn't take long for him to start noticing every small detail about you. How your fingers would lightly trace the rim of your cup, how you would sit at the same table by the window, always with your back to the street.

Without realizing it, his hands had moved to the back of counter, pulling open the drawer where his sketchbook lay hidden. He had long since stopped sketching his dreams, but something about the way you sat there, so effortlessly composed, ignited something deep inside him.

Each time you returned, Milo sketched. At first, it was small. But soon, the pages of his sketchbook were filled with portrait after portrait of you.

You were his muse, even if you didn't know it.

And then, the inevitable happened.

Milo was walking past your table when his sketchbook slipped from his hand, the pages fanning out in slow motion before it hit the floor with a soft thud. His heart raced as he knelt to pick it up, but his fingers froze as the pages opened to the exact drawings of you.

He quickly closed it. His heart pounded painfully in his chest as your eyes met his, and for a brief, terrifying second, he feared you would leave, or worse, that you would look at him with disgust.

“I-It’s not mine..!”